@TRyanGregory:
You have got to be f*cking kidding.
@StevenT65674368:
Holy fu€k
If you mean by icon grotesque, inhumane criminal, then yes, icon it is.
@politicalbones:
Bonnie Henry should be in jail, not held up on a pedestal.
@TrudeausAss:
Your opinion writer was a paid civil servant damage control hack who is still obviously getting paid to protect this horrible criminal.
@revivalcare.bsky.social:
Bonnie Henry directed BC emergency responders to not answer overdose 911 calls early in the pandemic.
To Bonnie Henry, marginalized populations are expendable.
Elevating Bonnie Henry to federal health leadership is a vote for social murder.
“Canada needs a calm, decisive sociopath to stand over the failing bodies of the poor as they die.”
This is what an endorsement of Bonnie Henry sounds like to me.
@kricketts.bsky.social:
Bonnie Henry is anything but an icon. Her negligence caused deaths. She had the balls to publicly announce covid is not airborne when she knew it was. She has blood on her hands. Please get a competent leader of Public Health.
@MakeGovtSmall:
You gotta be fucking joking! Are all of you at the Star completely retarded? Bonnie Henry is a corrupt clown.
@kirstenmalenaa:
She’s like #6 on my list for worst person in Canada
@EmJayNabuurs:
Oh my goodness, @TorontoStar!
Henry has been ABHORRENT during the pandemic! Useless, sharing falsehoods frequently, minimizing, running tests on kids without parent/caregiver acknowledgement, and on and on and on.
Who on gawd’s green Earth funded this article?
@patriciaorpat:
That’s a good question. Who funded this?
@corruptario:
Anne Marie Aikin, who wrote this piece, was the official spokesperson for Metrolinx for over a decade. She also did comms for TPH back in the day. Useful flack for the bad people.
She is working for a PR and government relations firm called Curious Public Relations. I imagine a client paid her to write and pitch this. Same firm hosted a webinar with Tim Hudak the other day.
https://curiouspublic.com/team/
@patriciaorpat:
I recognize her name actually. So awful that the Star would run this one-sided fluff piece.
@BraeburnHeather:
Dr. Bonnie Henry did not show decisive leadership. Sure, she was calm, and we needed that, but she failed to tell people that Covid is airborne, and that we need to breathe CLEAN air to stay healthy and avoid Long Covid, i.e. better ventilation and we need to normalizing masks.
@DrFiliatrault:
Folks, if you can please leave a comment below the article on the Toronto Star. I also left one on Linked In under the author’s own post.
Let’s not let people rewrite history and embellish epic fails.
@bobmackin:
The author has little experience in reporting on public health. And it shows.
@gtamoeb:
You have got to me kidding me. She downplays Covid is airborne and still a massive health risk for everyone especially after repeat infections. Doesn’t require masking in healthcare for even the most vulnerable. The list goes on. Around the world she is considered one of the worst PHOs by experts in aerosol and covid science.
@onmymarkgo:
Icon?
Preserving trust in institutions?
How low are your standards for success?
@MarieTattersall:
can’t wait for this post to be lambasted
by everyone who understands
what a diabolical fraud Henry is
claiming schools aren’t a source of transmission
while constantly minimizing the impact of SARS CoV-2
of course she’s just a conduit to express the will
of BC’s prov gov
Henry was handpicked to sculpt the public narrative
Media made No attempt to expose how PH is structured, governed or operationalized
politicians/PH officials know COVID is Airborne, causes chronic illness, disability & premature death
@unMaskedRogue:
She lied about Covid not being a threat to kids. She lied about how it’s transmitted. She lied about the pandemic being behind us. She killed and disabled countless people.
@LeftFlank369
No one should be following the lead of Butcher Bonnie.
@bearandwolflove:
No, Henry destroyed the public‘a trust in public health.
@RamblingMadman3:
She lied and was paid for it
@Greatsave35:
WHAT?!?
Bonnie Henry was an unmitigated disaster. Completely anti-science with a total disregard to evolving situations and new data.
Why isn’t she still in a like role in Ontario, like she was 20 years ago?
Because you shipped your trash out west to start all over!
DISGRACE.
@getacluekid:
This is absolutely disgusting. She knowingly pushed policies which have caused harm to Canadians. She has made a mockery out of public health.
@KojakJFK:
You’re idiots. She fucked up SARS1 in 2003. In 2020 she said low risk, wrong. She said enhanced screening when there was none. She was too late with care home protocols. She said not airborne. Wrong on every goddamn thing.
@livinonthenorth:
Are you fucking kidding me? That maniac should be in jail!
@Spook99synergy:
Nice propaganda. She’s as dangerous as your paper. Put her ass in jail.
@Frances17033:
COVID icon?!? Only if it’s Opposite Day. She led to more death and disability by actively opposing mitigations.
DontVoteSplit:
She’s the worst. THE WORST. She has done untold harm to public health in Canada, minimizing and denying the ongoing risk to human health of repeat COVID infections, including to children, the role of school transmission, promoting droplet dogma etc.
@hill_frank52476:
Bonnie Henry violated her Oath ‘to do no harm’….
@BerezanCarolyn:
I would image she got paid pretty good taking her orders from the globalists and killing off her share of the population.
@comradck:
She’s a murderer? Her policies killed my cousin.
@arijitchakrav:
The free press never dies, it just turns into a joke.
This hagiographer, who runs a PR consulting firm, is painting Bonnie Henry – who successfully infected BC kids with Covid & then published a paper on it- as an exemplar of public health leadership.
Make it make sense
We’re in desperate need of calm, decisive leadership. Let’s follow the lead of this COVID-era icon by Anne Marie Aikins, March 12, 2025, Toronto Star 
reads like garbage published in the Toronto Sun
Anne Marie Aikins spent two decades in public service as a chief spokesperson supporting agencies through many challenging crises. She is now a media and crisis communications executive and a consultant with the PR firm Curious Public. Why the hell would a cruel heartless social murderer like Dr Evil Henry need a PR firm to glorify her? Henry’s “Be kind, Wash your hands, COVID is not airborne” lies not working any more? Is she lusting for more killing?
As we watch our political leaders grapple with the chaos of a head-spinning trade war, I can’t help but reflect on another crisis — and the remarkable leadership of British Columbia’s Provincial Health Officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry.
During the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic, Henry emerged as a national symbol of calm, compassionate, and effectivelying leading to many sickened and dead leadership. Her clear communication not only reassured the public but also maintained trust in health directives. In a time of chaos, she cruelly killed many innocent Canadiansmade us feel less powerless. Her empathetic eugenics Hitlerapproach, encapsulated in messages like “be kind, be calm, be safe,” resonated deeply withconned many Canadians — though, of course, not with the conspiracy theorists who believed the vaccines were implanting government listening devices.
This piece is pure shit, lying frac shit. I won’t waste my time calling out all the lies. Disgusting social murder enabling by Toronto Star and this PR stunt.
Henry’s leadership, alongside that of many (though not all) government officials, helped Canadians navigate the terrifying pandemic while preserving trust in public institutions. Her leadership was widely considered a master class in authenticity and compassion, and undoubtedly saved lives and left a legacy that history will remember kindly.
Now, as tariffs and economic uncertainty loom large, we need leaders who embody similar qualities: resilience, strategic thinking, clear communication, empathy, and transparency. A crisis — whether it’s a global pandemic or a Toronto snowstorm that strands parents and people with mobility challenges — demands leaders who are calm, decisive, and resilient under pressure. The public looks to the leader for a transparent plan that includes both actions on the government and individual level.
True leaders don’t shift blame. They take accountability, ensuring their teams and the public understand the situation, the plan, and their roles. They acknowledge challenges while maintaining confidence and optimism to keep morale high.
Leaders who deflect responsibility erode trust — a lesson Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow hopefully absorbed during the snowstorm criticism as she demonstrated an inclination to blame staff.
Accountability is the hallmark of strong leadership. Great leaders own their decisions, learn from mistakes, and inspire trust through integrity and consistency. They delegate wisely, empower their teams, and publicly credit others for their contributions. During crises, people look to leaders for reassurance. The best leaders listen, foster unity, and recognize the emotional toll of difficult times.
Crises spark fear and anxiety because they are unpredictable and rapidly evolving. Leaders must adapt quickly, communicate frequently, and adjust strategies as new information emerges. Henry exemplified this during the pandemic, explaining ever-changing developments and new direction with clarity — a monumental task.
Contrast this with U.S. President Donald Trump’s erratic tariff policies, which caused the crisis in the first place and is now amplifying uncertainty. Trump’s behaviour is designed to keep Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on edge (fortunately our outgoing PM has risen to the challenge and may even, in the end leave a legacy that matters).
While maddening, Trump’s shifting stance also serves to distract and manipulate the media — and, by extension, the public. Ontario Premier Doug Ford capitalized on the moment to get himself re-elected. However, he deserves some credit for many of his efforts in response to the tariffs.
Effective leaders make tough decisions without hesitation. Ford’s initial waffling on retaliatory measures didn’t inspire confidence — his beleaguered LCBO staff might be tempted to sample the bourbon themselves if Ford changes direction again. wrong again, Ford is on team Trump/IDU/Harper. Never trust fascista agents Doug Ford, Scott Moe, Danielle Smith, Kevin Lying O’Leary, Pierre Picklehead, etc.
On Tuesday he swiftly paused a 25 per cent surcharge on electricity sold to the U.S. the day after imposing it.
His team must act swiftly, but consistently, and consider long-term consequences when responding to Trump
Finally, inspiring leaders are forward-thinking. While managing immediate crises, they also plan for recovery and long-term stability. By instilling confidence, adapting to challenges, and leading with clarity and integrity, they can ensure their teams, and the public emerge stronger.
As historian and author Rutger Bregman aptly puts it: “Make future historians proud (again).” Perhaps it’s time our leaders, including whoever might be our next prime minister in the next election, put that on a hat — and wore it with Canadian pride.Struck out. That’s better.
@TheTrueJasonM:
Sure, why not?
Bonnie Henry’s “infect everyone” and antimask attitude led to my mother being infected at least 3 times in her LTC facility, which I have no doubt led to my mom’s massive stroke and premature death at the start of this month.
Yeah, Henry’s a real hero. Sure.
Theresa:
Sure she sounded good, but she makes bad medical decisions, and surely it was her job to make good ones? Throughout the pandemic she has continued to minimize airborne transmission, and minimized the risk children faced in schools, leading to increased death and disability. I would consider that the opposite of good leadership.
Rick:
Henry is the worst possible person – ok, RFK Jr or Issac Bogoch might be worse – to lead Canada’s public health professionals. She botched both SARS outbreaks and consistently provided guidance throughout SARS2-COVID-19 that matched political desires rather than legitimate scientific evidence. She’s not a legitimate public health professional, she’s a political opportunist.
Colin:
Seriously? Dr. Henry? She fought masks as much as anyone in BC. She had to be dragged kicking and screaming to instate a masking policy in schools. Her stubborn refusal to acknowledge that COVID was airborne cost people lives.
And then she had the audacity to say schools were safe places during the pandemic, even though (at the same time) she was co-authoring a report that revealed 80% of children in the lower mainland had COVID at least once.And the evil killer did her study on kids without parental notification or permission. Absolutely, she needs to be fired, and in prison, for the rest of her live. Her profession demands she did/does no harm yet it appears she intentionally sickened and killed many, and caused a dangerous fast mutating pathogen to spread, all to feed her fucking greed and ego. Worse, she knew/knows better from SARSCov1.My granddaughter STILL has long COVID. Follow her lead?
Dr. Henry should be fired and put in jail.
***
How denial of airborne COVID transmission broke the world by Blake Murdoch, Mar 10, 2025, Healthy Debate
As we mark five years since the emergence of SARS-COV-2, the most grievous error of the global pandemic response has become very clear.
It’s not “lockdowns,” as many right-leaning folks might suggest. Nor is it the inflation-stoking government support measures and central bank policies that many have argued were highly excessive. It’s not even the failure to address online health misinformation, as centrists and leftists might claim. It’s even more basic and essential than that.
Indeed, these concerns were partly induced by a single major scientific inaccuracy first illustrated at the World Health Organization (WHO) Coronavirus press conference on Feb. 11, 2020, when WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said:
Failure to reasonably presume, then later accept the airborne spread of COVID and operationalize the appropriate structural mitigations is at the source of every major shortcoming in our response to the pandemic, and every major form of physical, mental, economic and social harm it has brought about. It doomed our public health, social and economic responses, ensuring they would not be fully effective, appropriately targeted and minimally disruptive, ultimately leading to many divisions in society we see today.
Allow me to explain. Let’s imagine a world where key experts and evidence were not discounted, and where the dominance of airborne transmission of SARS-COV-2 was quickly accepted and acted upon.
Before we get to that, it’s important to understand that the focus on “droplet transmission” has always been an inaccurate and dogmatic representation of the physics of SARS-COV-2, which mostly spreads in small aerosols that people release during simple behaviours like breathing and talking, and that remain suspended in the air like smoke. SARS1 was also famously airborne. Many of the world’s leading bioaerosol scientists quickly recognized the clear evidence of airborne COVID transmission but were dismissed and excluded from policymaking input by gatekeepers at every level. In October 2022, Jeremy Farrar – who months later became Chief Scientist of the WHO – said it “was a very big mistake” to not take aerosol transmission seriously, and that airborne mitigations “would have saved an enormous number of lives.”
Figure 1. -SARS1 Commission Final Report, Ontario, Canada, 2006
A second important fact is that N95 respirators are specifically designed to protect from aerosols. By comparison, surgical masks have large air gaps and are not designed to protect from aerosols. Respirators are so effective that United Kingdom research has indicated their use by the public would have dropped the rate of COVID transmission by an estimated factor of 9, compared with 0.6 for surgical masks. A factor of 9 is enough to put SARS-COV-2 into exponential decay, meaning the virus would have been highly suppressed for as long as respirator use continued. The exponential math of viral spread also means that perfect masking compliance would not have been required to achieve suppression.
Let’s consider a timeline in which these facts had been acted upon.
Lockdowns
With airborne mitigations, many of the common complaints about “lockdowns” would never have materialized. Most closures would have remained necessary for a briefer period, until respirator manufacturing ramped up and respirators were distributed to the public for use in shared spaces.
Simultaneously, a fraction of the trillions saved by reducing the length of economic closures would have been spent to begin installing greatly improved ventilation, filtration and germicidal lighting systems (which can generate dozens of air change equivalents per hour) in every public indoor space, starting with schools, hospitals and other congregate settings. Public reporting of indoor air data like CO2 levels would have been mandated, along with the deployment of air quality inspectors analogous to those used to audit commercial kitchens. These are the structural mitigations that greatly reduce public health reliance on behavioural compliance, i.e. masking.
School closures would have been uniformly short-lived, minimally disrupting children’s learning and their parents’ work, and ending once respirator masks could be provided and used. Contemporaneous overhauls of indoor air quality systems would have greatly reduced transmission of COVID and other viruses while improving student health, attendance and academic performance. Some anti-mask sentiment would have developed over time, but by the time it could become an overpowering force, air quality improvements would largely have been completed and optional masking would have been feasible with low transmission.
Figure 2-New engineering standards for preventing airborne infections indoors have been publicly available for almost two years.
Health care
In hospitals, staff would have received N95 respirators within the first months and used them continuously, and air quality improvements would have been implemented. Staff would have ceased using surgical masks. Millions of health-care workers worldwide would have been spared infections, Long COVID or death, increasing the available experienced workforce and reducing rates of burnout-related resignation.
Millions of patient hospitalizations and deaths would have been prevented by societal mitigations; millions of hospital-acquired COVID infections would never have happened – averting the ongoing health-care overcapacity and collapse we continue to experience today. Hundreds of billions to trillions in health-care costs could have been saved globally.
Antivaccine sentiment
While existing COVID-19 vaccines prevent hospitalization, death and some Long COVID, their inability to durably prevent infection with the efficacy initially advertised by key officials likely contributed to decreased uptake of updated formulations. Some people misunderstood the value of vaccination and questioned the value of periodic boosters after still being infected despite vaccination.
Airborne mitigations would have greatly reduced viral transmission and therefore reduced evolution, that is to say the production of new variants. Consequently, this would have increased the average efficacy of vaccines by enabling periodically updated formulations to more closely match currently circulating variants instead of being far behind. The increased effectiveness of vaccines and the decreased rates of infection would have thwarted much of the public’s learned apathy, very likely improving ongoing vaccine uptake.
Superior vaccine effectiveness and greatly reduced transmission also would have helped neutralize the narratives of vaccine skeptics. The huge reduction in COVID-induced thromboses, organ damage and new chronic medical conditions like Long COVID (estimated to have impacted 400 million people) would have prevented many individuals from blaming vaccine injury for their viral ills, reducing the growth of antivaccination attitudes and the likelihood of politicians strategically weaponizing this subculture to sow division and seek power as we see today.
Anti-mask sentiment
Millions of people have been infected while wearing cloth and surgical masks. This has contributed to a commonly held belief that masks don’t work, even though respirators are highly effective. The early use of appropriate airborne personal protective equipment in the form of respirators would have reduced the popularity of the myth that “masks don’t work.”
Today, the politicization of masking has led to disinformation campaigns and newly spreading mask bans that threaten not only people’s health but also their civil liberties.
Figure 3-President Trump proclaiming “NO MASKS!” and threatening colleges over political protests.
Economic harm
As you’ve likely gathered by now, operationalizing a proper response with respirator masking and indoor air improvements would have allowed the economy to operate mostly normally, with a few exceptions. Airborne mitigations would have been appropriately targeted and minimally disruptive. As such, global government debt spending to fund citizen and business supports could have been reduced by trillions of dollars; what was spent could have been targeted to workers and industries experiencing more significant impacts, such as the restaurant sector. This would have prevented most profiteering, unnecessary corporate subsidizing and the hollowing out of small businesses in favour of large corporations, all of which occurred due to inequitably applied government programs.
The massive reduction in economic shock inherent in an airborne mitigation strategy would have altered central banks’ pandemic policies on a global scale and prevented much of the inflation crisis. Interest rates would still have dropped as the pandemic spread, but likely with far less accompanying quantitative easing, and with a quicker return to more historical neutral rates and policies. The ability for logistical supply chains to operate with far fewer serious disruptions would likewise have averted much of the observed increases in input and manufacturing costs, further reducing inflationary pressures.
The newly generated multi-billion- and trillion-dollar sovereign debts currently affecting sociopolitical and economic stability worldwide would have been greatly reduced. The “K-shaped” economic recovery whereby wealth stratification between the wealthy and poor/middle class skyrocketed would be less severe. Lower inflation and government debt could have prevented millions from falling below the poverty line.
Social disunity and polarization
Social disunity and polarization today is multifactorial, but partly stems from several key changes affecting people and their environment – namely increased poverty, erosion of purchasing power, unprocessed trauma and grief, worsening physical and mental health, and the top-down promotion of directives like “you do you” – the antisocial idea implying people have a right to recklessly infect and harm others in the pursuit of self-interest.
Airborne mitigation would have prevented a significant amount of disunity and polarization – even if we set aside the reality of COVID-induced brain damage, the strong association between infection and new onset mental health disorders, and hypotheses about potential impacts on personality.
Far fewer individuals would be grief stricken by loss or chronic illness; fewer might have turned to denialism, conspiracies or anti-scientific explanations to assuage themselves. Depression from social isolation would have been reduced. Relatively better purchasing power would have decreased persistent stress over obtaining the basic necessities of life, widespread feelings of helplessness about corporate servitude and, consequentially, apathy and antisocial behaviour. Politicization of disagreement as well as hatemongering by politicians and bad actors may have been reduced with less fertile ground to sow the seeds of disunity. As a result, subsequent leaders may not have adopted such deeply anti-science perspectives, and we might not be on the precarious political path we face today.
A world fractured
Unfortunately, due in large part to the failure to identify and ongoing failure to act on the basic problem the pandemic presented – airborne COVID transmission – we live in a fragmented world. The problems stemming from this failure continue to compound across all aspects of life.Dr. Bonnie Henry is / was one of the most evil liars, shouting no masks, lying saying the virus was not airborne, be kind fucking wash your hands but spew all the contagion you like via nose and mouth. How many innocent Canadians did Henry kill via COVID? How many alive but with much brain damage? Wrecked immune systems? Organs failing, unable to work, miserable? I lost far too many dear friends to COVID because of monsters like Bonnie Henry, friends that suffered terribly as they died.
Instead of truly fixing the core problem, one day, we were told by corporations and politicians that the pandemic was over. We decided to agree. Pretending that the problem was solved felt easy, and unprocessed grief about the loss of the pre-COVID era continues to reinforce this frame of thought.
Indeed, the CDC for years has focused on telling people to wash their hands to prevent the spread of COVID, despite the fact that its own reporting estimated a less than one in 10,000 chance of COVID infection from touching a surface with live virus on it.
In other words, some of the leading public health communication remains utterly detached from scientific evidence. Indeed, then-CDC Director Rochelle Walensky even publicly stigmatized our most effective preventive tool, stating that “the scarlet letter of this pandemic is the mask.” Imagine if she had said something like this about vaccines.
We have repeatedly exposed ourselves and our children to this virus, and most of us are not even vaccinated with the most recent formulation. The inability to cope with the idea that we are harmed by viral infections, unlike exposures to commensal bacteria, has contributed to social adoption of the tenet that getting sick will improve health through immunity. Given immunity is short-lived for COVID and many other viruses, this narrative primarily enables those who might otherwise feel helpless to deny reality rather than come to terms with widespread preventable harm, including the possibility of prevalent “silent organ damage.” This narrative has also supercharged the antivaccination movement with the idea that infection is “natural” and better than prophylaxis.
Perhaps most damning is that vulnerable people in hospitals and clinics continue to be discarded to suffer and die from nosocomial infections because decision-makers still refuse to implement the measures necessary to prevent disease, even though airborne transmission is now clearly codified. As a working bioethicist who regularly reviews adverse event reports about vulnerable patients dying of hospital-acquired COVID infections, and indeed other airborne pathogens, this is deeply unsettling.
Life will never truly be convenient or comforting while we turn a blind eye to the spread of harmful and disabling disease in our communities. Denial and inaction are not solutions. Demanding clean air just as we demand clean water is the solution. We must learn this lesson in order to stop the spread of COVID-19 and to avoid the worst outcomes of the next pandemic, which could strike any day.
And it will probably be another airborne virus.
Refer also to: